Use your Windows Phone to get more miles per gallon

With the Holiday Season in full swing, many find themselves traveling more. Last week our Windows Phone App Roundup dealt with Windows Phone apps for the air traveler. This week we focus on Windows Phone apps designed for those who stick to the road for their travel needs. In particular, gas mileage apps.

These apps can help you find the nearest gas station, track your car's performance, track the cost of fuel, and some will even help you keep track of routine service on your car. We picked a handful of apps out from the Windows Phone Store that jumped off the page at us for this weeks roundup.

Car-Pal+ ($1.99): Car-pal+ is a simple and straight forward app that lets you track your gas mileage, find gas stations and remind you of any routine service checks for your car. Car-pal+ has a Dashboard page that displays your current gas performance stats including miles per gallon, cost per mile, miles per fill up and days per fill up. At the bottom of the page you have tiles to enter your mileage and gas purchase information for each fill up, find gas stations near your location and set reminders for oil changes, tire rotations and fluid checks.

There is also a page that will display your fill up history detailing your fuel performance to help you keep track of everything from the price of fuel to miles per gallon.

Car-pal+ does support multiple vehicles but only displays information on one vehicle at a time. Future updates hope to expand Car-pal+ by adding an share/export feature for your fill-up history, a traffic alert feature and the ability to view gas station listings by price.

Car-pal+ is a nicely laid out app for your Windows Phone but there isn't a trial version available to let you try before you buy. Car-pal+ is currently running $1.99 and you can find it here at the Windows Phone Store.

Gas Mileage (free trial/$.99): Gas Mileage is a bare bones mileage tracking app for your Windows Phone. You simply enter your gas fill-up information (date, miles since last fill-up, gallons, and price) and Gas Mileage calculates the miles per gallon and generates a history of your fill-ups.

Gas Mileage does support multiple vehicles but will only display information on one vehicle at a time. You can export the fuel data as an XML document, that can be opened in Excel, by emailing it to yourself or anyone else for that matter.

If you're looking for a simple, no frills way to track your gas mileage... Gas Mileage is worth a try. There is a free trial that is limited to one vehicle and the full version of Gas Mileage is running $.99. You can find it all here at the Windows Phone Store.

Mileage Log (free): Mileage Log is another fairly straight forward gas mileage app for your Windows Phone. Each vehicle is represented by a journal and within each journal enter your fill-up information (odometer reading, quantity, date, cost per gallon/unit). All this information is digested and displayed on a mileage history page.

The mileage history page shows your beginning/ending mileage, gallons used, miles per gallon, and cost per gallon per 100 miles for each entry period. There is also a summary page for each journal detailing activity such as the maximum/minimum mpg, gallons used, and distance between fill-ups.

Journals can be backed up and restored from your SkyDrive account and your mileage entries emailed but in text form. It's nice that you can back up your data but it would also be nice to share the data in spreadsheet format.

Mileage Log is a nice free option for tracking your gas mileage. It doesn't have too many bells and whistles though. It is a free app for your Windows Phone and you can find Mileage Loghere at the Windows Phone Store.

Car Journal (free trial/$.99): Car Journal not only lets you track your gas mileage but also tracks routine service histories. The main pages for Car Journal lists the vehicles in your fleet and any upcoming service issues (oil change, air filter change, tire rotation, etc.).

In tapping an individual vehicle, Car Journal will display the mileage history (the ten most recent fill-ups), the service reminders, and the car's details (make, model, year, etc.).

Gas mileage entry was a little cumbersome in that the entry fields across two pages and you have to enter the current mileage and previous mileage numbers. It would have been nice if the previous mileage was automatically generated based on the previous fill-up entry.

The service page lists the types of service you create and in tapping the individual service type, you can add service entries and view the service history. If you are overdue, the Service Page will list the overdue service in red.

Car Journal has potential but really needs to streamline the entry process. While Car Journal does support multiple vehicles, it doesn't have any means to backup the data or export it. There is a free trial version (180 day limit) and the full version of Car Journal will cost you $.99. You can find Car Journalhere at the Windows Phone Store.

Auto Total (free trial/$1.99): Auto Total is more of a complete vehicle management app. Auto Total not only tracks gas mileage but also routine service history, accident history, tire management, repair history, insurance information, inspection history, traffic citations, and car wash history.

The main pages for Auto Total include a vehicle page with tiles to enter fuel information, the vehicle's details, access the app's settings, import/export the data to your SkyDrive account (for backup purposes), edit the app's data lists, and vehicle plate information. The is also a "new" tile that gives you access to all the other categories pertaining to your vehicle.

The main pages also contain a Recent Activities page, a Statistics page and an Info (About) page. Auto Total does support multiple vehicles (just tap on the vehicle name on the main page to switch between vehicles).

Auto Total is a very comprehensive vehicle management app for your Windows Phone. The app contains a lot of information entry, so much it could be overwhelming. The only feature missing that comes to mind is the ability to export data in spreadsheet format or maybe navigation maps.

There is a free trial version available for Auto Total with the full version running $1.99. You can find it all here at the Windows Phone Store.

GasBuddy (free): While GasBuddy won't track your gas mileage, it will help you find the best price for gas. It taps into the online GasBuddy.com service to find help find the best price from gas stations in your area.

Gas Buddy's interface is simple. You can enter your city/zip to search for gas prices of just tap the center gas pump icon to find gas prices based on your location. Search results can be sorted by price, fuel grade and mapped out. In tapping on an individual gas station, you can find more detailed information on that station including a map to the station, features or amenities available (restrooms, convenience store, etc.) and pictures of the station. Gas stations can also be pinned to your Start Screen for easy reference.

There is a free membership available to GasBuddy. Members have the ability to report gas prices to earn tickets that can be redeemed as entries to weekly gas giveaway contests.

It would be nice if GasBuddy had a simple gas mileage feature but, as is, it is a nice companion app for your gas mileage tracking app. GasBuddy is a free app for your Windows Phone and you can find it here at the Windows Phone Store.

Keeping track of your gas mileage is important because it not only helps you track expenses but can also be an indicator that your vehicle is in need of repair. If you go from 23 miles per gallon to 10, there might be a mechanical issue that needs attention.

There are plenty gas mileage and automotive maintenance apps in the Windows Phone Store and the roundup is but a snapshot of what's available. If we missed your favorite, feel free to share in the comments below.

Reader comments

Use your Windows Phone to get more miles per gallon

As a company car driver who has to account for all petrol purchased, do any of these apps allow me to enter the petrol purchase, then it run when required with a simple press of a tile a program that logs my current position, then when pushed again, it ends the journey and logs the journey mileage

Metric is the number 1 option for non-US people for these types of apps. It would be good if the reviews mentioned this. It would be great if there was an option to call it "petrol" instead of "gas" too :P

I've been looking for an al in one app, going to give Auto Total a spin.
I used Tripdots for a while which is a cool app, but, doesn't give much access to historical data once you enter it from what I found.

I'm working on a new app currently because none of the current apps fill the exact need I have. I'm not sure when it will be ready. I may chose to release it in phases, but the first phase wouldn't be much better than what's on the market now.
I'll share more in the forum when I get anywhere near to having a full V1 feature set.

I've been using Car Bloke and it has similar features allowing you to track gas mileage as well as service history and it has metrics to track cost and fuel consumption and it also free from the store.